1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printing system having a printing device for executing print processing on a paper sheet, a control method, a storage medium, a program, and a printing device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, commercial printing businesses issue publications via various processes. These processes include, for example, manuscript reception, assignment of design to the manuscript, layout & edit, comprehensive layout (presentation by means of printer output), proofing (layout correction & color correction), proof print, artwork preparation, print, post-process, shipping, and the like.
In particular, artwork preparation is mandatory in commercial printing business since the print process prevalently uses an offset prepress. However, once an artwork is prepared, it is difficult and disadvantageous in terms of cost to correct it. Artwork preparation inevitably requires careful proofing (i.e., careful layout check and color confirmation jobs). For this reason, it is a common practice to require a certain term until issuance of publications is complete.
Such commercial printing businesses require large-scale devices in respective processes, and also high cost. In addition, these operations require expert knowledge, that is, know-how of experts called craftsmen.
Against such circumstances, in recent years, along with the advent of high-speed, high image quality electrophotographic printing devices and ink-jet printing devices, a so-called Print On Demand (to be abbreviated as POD hereinafter) market prevails as competition with the aforementioned commercial printing business.
The POD has appeared aiming at handling jobs of relatively smaller lots within short delivery periods without using any large-scale device or system in place of the large-scale printing press and printing scheme.
The POD market implements digital prints using digital data by fully utilizing a printing device such as a digital copying machine, digital multi-function peripheral, and the like, and can provide print services and the like.
Such POD market merges digitalization compared to the conventional commercial printing business, effectively utilizes computerized management and control, can actually issue printed materials within a short delivery period, and has a merit to obviate the need for know-how of operators. Furthermore, the image quality of printed matters is approaching the commercial printing business level.
In consideration of such situation, office equipment manufacturers and the like have examined entry into a new field, that is, the POD market (see Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2005-165722). These manufacturers have made detailed examinations while assessing the market trends, and have explored printing devices and printing systems exploitable in POD environments in which cases of use and needs different from office environments are assumed. Note that one image of the POD environment is a company which does the following business. That is, a company that purchased printing devices from the office equipment manufacturer receives a print order from a given customer, and creates printed materials according to the request from the customer as final deliverables using the printing devices. The company delivers the created print matters to the customer to receive payment.
Under the assumption of a printing environment in such POD market, methods for improving productivity using the printing system are expected to be emphasized in the future. In addition, methods for allowing the operators of the printing system to easily use the printing system while maintaining high productivity are expected to be emphasized in the future.
In order to allow the office equipment manufacturers and the like to fully participate in the new field, that is, the POD market, as described above, it is desirable to assume the circumstances of the POD market, as described above, and to cope with those which occur less frequently in the office environment. In other words, examination of the practical use of the product of a digital printing system suited to the POD environment needs to be fully made as in the above reference. However, assuming a drive for the practical use of the product of the printing system also suited to the POD environment, items yet to be examined and issues that cannot be covered by only the arrangement disclosed in the above reference still remain.
For example, in the office environment, the selection candidates of paper sheets used in printing by the printing device are at most about 10 to 30 types. On the other hand, for example, the POD environment assumes situations in which 100 or more types of paper sheets must line up. This is because the POD environment must create printed materials that meet delicate requests from the customers as deliverables. Put differently, as a practical example, in a given situation, the customers may designate various conditions about paper sheets to be used in printing such as the manufacturers, qualities (surface nature, glossiness), sizes, types, weights (basis weights), and the like of paper sheets. In another situation, even when a customer may not directly designate a detailed request about paper sheets, the operator who works on the POD environment may determine paper sheets suited to deliverables that the customer wants. To cope with such situations, a very large number of types of paper sheets may be prepared in the POD environment. In consideration of such situations, it is desirable to configure the printing device (or printing system) to cope with a large number of types of paper sheets. Or preferably, it is desirable to configure not only to selectively use a larger number of types of paper sheets but also to execute appropriate print processes suited to the natures of paper sheets required in printing. For example, a configuration is desired to flexibly execute control about print processes such as temperature control, conveyance control, and the like of the printing device in accordance with the natures of paper sheets used in printing.
For example, in the conventional printing device, control parameters associated with the print processes are handled as control information inside the device, which is managed inside the device in advance, and cannot be arbitrarily registered and changed by the operator who uses the printing device, as exemplified above. This is because the selection candidates of paper sheets used in printing by the printing device are at most about 10 to 30 types in the office environment and the like, as exemplified above. Therefore, the aforementioned parameter handling results from the printing device which has already been configured to cope with such number of selection candidates of paper sheets in the manufacture of it.
However, as exemplified above, the POD environment may cope with several hundred types of paper sheets in the future. Hence, in order to allow creation of printed matters with quality that meets the requirements of the customer, it is desirable to allow the operator who works on the POD environment to set the control parameters associated with the print processes in correspondence with paper sheets used in the POD environment, as exemplified above. As described above, upon configuring the printing device to cope with a very large number of types of paper sheets, it is desirable to allow the operator of the printing device to set and register the control parameters, as exemplified above.
Also, in such configuration, it is desirable not to force the operator of the printing device in the POD environment to make troublesome operations for selecting a paper sheet from a very large number of types of selection candidates of paper sheets upon making the printing device execute printing according to a print request from the customer. As described above, use of the configuration as exemplified above may impair the operability of the operator. It is desirable to minimize occurrence of such a problem.
As described above, in order to aim at the practical use of the product of the printing system which is also suited to the POD environment, it is desirable to cope with various cases of use and user needs, as exemplified above.